Halo 4: Slipspace Journeys
by TwainII
Summary: The Master Chief and Cortana find themselves in a galaxy far far away.


Halo 4: Slipspace Journeys

Summary: The Chief find themselves in a galaxy far far away…

Disclaimer: I do not own the Halo universe, or the characters in it.

Prologue

Two months since the events of Halo 3

Cortana's POV

I was lonely, and it had been two months since John had gone into cryo. I can calculate billions of equations and algorithms every second. Extremely long story short, I've been sitting idle for one hundred years in AI time. At times I was bored, at others I could cry, and still others I felt as if rampancy was drawing near. I would have completely powered myself down, but I needed to watch the ship, the Chief, and the cold, dark space around us. This was the only thing I had to keep myself occupied. It wasn't much, but it keeps me sane, for now anyway.

I was performing an active scan, checking anything and everything, hoping for a rescue, when a silhouette appeared in slipspace on the edge of my scans. It as it got closer; I saw how large the silhouette was. I for a moment, I thought it was a Covenant battle group, seeing as in slipspace, they were distorted so they looked like a single mass. Double checking, I saw that as it got closer, it got smaller. It was definitely a single ship. That did nothing to ease my worries. One ship or ten ships, the one we were in was tiny, so much that part of I had to stay in the Chief, frozen, in order to fit. It also had no offensive capabilities, unless I counted the Chiefs assault rifle and pistol.

Suddenly, it appeared out of slipspace. I finally saw the ship. It looked like no ship I'd ever seen. On the side, I saw the name of the ship, _The Negotiator_, though my scans. In actuality, though, the ship had its underside facing us. The bottom of the ship started to glow, and I felt myself involuntarily moving closer to whatever was pulling us closer. Suddenly, the comms system received a signal, The ship was hailing us! I attempted to respond, but the encryption codes they asked for were in a language that matched neither human nor Covenant dialects. I had no idea what to do, and I felt a nanosecond of irritation, as this had been happening more and more often since installation 04, the first Halo. I then move to more immediate things. I had to wake the Chief

Chief's POV

"Chief! Chief!" Said a voice I soon identified as Cortana's. Suddenly remembering where I was, I thought another ship had finally found us, but then I recalled the fear in her voice. As she unlocked my cryo, I shoved the door open quickly removed Cortana from the ship computer, and inserted her into my neural implants, all while snatching an HE pistol off of the table. I soon realized there was no one on the ship, but something else, something REALLY BIG tearing it apart. I glanced at the viewport on my way out and saw what I thought was the underside of a ship.

I blasted a piece of shrapnel out of my way and almost flew out of a gaping hole in the ship when my lightning reflexes grabbed a pair of hand holds. I saw a bright light where the other "ship" (if that's what it was) happened to be. Is that a _Covenant plasma cannon?_ I thought. "Probably not" Cortana replied "My scans come up inconclusive, and if it is, we're going to be space dust." That's Cortana for you, always optimistic. "Judging from the fact that we're still alive, and the decreasing proximity of the ship, I hypothesize that this is a tractor beam."

"Did you try to hail the ship?" I asked. "Negative, they attempted to hail us, but the encryption codes are like nothing I've seen. It has absolutely no resemblance to any human dialect, no resemblance to any known Covenant dialect. Possible non-Covenant vectors within 2500 kilometers." Non-Covenant vectors. I could only sigh. Between Guilty Spark and the Flood, I'd had enough of non-Covenant. I wish this could be the old days when I would shoot kill the Elites and watch the subordinate Grunt run in terror. Life used to be so simple.

"Alright," I say resignedly "If they're going to pull us in, I' going to be prepared." With the ship fully depressurized, I was able to collect an MA5B and some ammunition for it and the pistol. "Be careful, Chief, they haven't fired at us yet, so they may not be hostile. We don't want to make them shoot at us." Promptly ignoring her, though leaving her warning in the back of my mind, I awaited the ship to arrive.

AN: This is my first post. Feel free to review, especially if I have any grammar or spelling mistakes. This Chapter is a little on the short side, but it's for a good reason. Besides, it's a prologue, who cares?


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